PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to investigate the impact of the global coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic on stock market liquidity, while taking into account the depth and tightness dimensions.Design/methodology/approachThe author used a panel data regression on stock market dataset, representing 314 listed firms operating in six Middle East and North African (MENA) countries from February to May 2020.FindingsThe regression results on the overall sample indicate that the liquidity related to the depth measure was positively correlated with the growth in the confirmed number of cases and deaths and stringency index. Moreover, the market depth was positively related to the confirmed cases of COVID-19. The results also indicate that the liquidity of small cap and big cap firms was significantly impacted by the confirmed number of cases, while the stringency index is only significant for the liquidity depth measure. Moreover, the results regarding sectors and country level analysis confirmed that COVID-19 had a significant and negative impact of stock market liquidity.Research limitations/implicationsThis paper confirms that the global coronavirus pandemic has decreased the stock market liquidity in terms of both the depth and the tightness dimensions.Originality/valueWhile most empirical papers focused on the impact of the COVID-19 global pandemic on stock market returns, this paper investigated liquidity chock at firm level in the MENA region using both tightness and depth dimensions.

Despite the fact that humanity has totally embraced the 21st century with its technological and innovation outcomes, poverty and social disparity still haunt most of the world’s leaders. This disturbing reality is also a major concern in Muslim countries. Although Shari’ah considers prosperity and the well-being of Muslims as one of its top priorities, most Muslim countries still suffer from high poverty rates and underdevelopment, which impede their prosperity and emergence as economic powers. This paper aims to propose concrete solutions for Islamic finance practitioners that combine both the profit-oriented feature of sukuk, risksharing principle and socioeconomic support to Muslim communities through a proposed Social Impact Sukuk model. The proposed structure is mainly based on the partnership contract (mudarabah), which is considered a cornerstone of Islamic finance. The structure involves a partnership between a Non-Government Organization (NGO) (mudarib) and the investors (rabbal-mal) where the State could be considered as a guarantor. Ultimately, the burden on the State will be optimized through a bilateral partnership between an NGO and private investors.

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